from Murs

March 21, 2015

A magnificent château dominates Murs . Murs was the haven and place where all the protestants (Cabrieres, Lacoste, Gordes) had settled to escape the persecution in mid 16th C. – women, children and old men. The feared baron of Oppede sent a lieutenant who started to defile the women and young girls, kill them and burn everything down they could find. Francois Morenas, a great Luberon specialist wrote about Murs:” Five years after the massacres their dried bones were still lying there”.

The walls circling the château are a thing of beauty. The building is privately owned and has quite a good deal of ‘f…k off’ emanating but it’s not a spa or apparently hideously ruined by the corporate world, maybe – who knows, all is hidden and discreet . . . . the trees are splendid.

Muscari are appearing in fields and verges. The acres of cherries and olive groves are carpeted with regular lines of dandelion sometimes mixed with Eruca, wild rocket. We decided on the Tour de Bérigoule circuit – 13kms – covering the valleys, the ‘balcones’ – the path that follows the contour of the rock face and offers up framed views to the east – and the 5 grottoes of a landscape that has strong historic references.

Good to look back and see the path that was covered early on . . .

. . . and the spoon shaped rock face to the west. While views from the balcones across the valley are quite mesmerizing . . .

. . . dropping down to La Bouisse, passing a cerisaie where good management was evident. Prunings well stacked and just the start of the flowering performance. Of the prunus family, the almonds are in full flower with a delicious scent and apricots too nearer Orange.

On the return to Murs. a formidable white oak stands sentinel at the entrance to the village – 16m spread.

It’s 3pm – school is finished and so are we after a long slightly taxing walk but that’s OK.

In a house which becomes a home,
one hands down and another takes up
the heritage of mind and heart,
laughter and tears, musings and deeds.
Love, like a carefully loaded ship,
crosses the gulf between the generations.
Therefore, we do not neglect the ceremonies
of our passage: when we wed, when we die,
and when we are blessed with a child;
When we depart and when we return;
When we plant and when we harvest.
Let us bring up our children. It is not
the place of some official to hand to them
their heritage.
If others impart to our children our knowledge
and ideals, they will lose all of us that is
wordless and full of wonder.
Let us build memories in our children,
lest they drag out joyless lives,
lest they allow treasures to be lost because
they have not been given the keys.
We live, not by things, but by the meanings
of things. It is needful to transmit the passwords
from generation to generation. Antoine de Saint-Exupery